Classic British Flight Sim

I know there are a few Sages around here that may be able to throw a bit of light on a strange problem I am having.

I am able to fly the LDS 767, CS C-130 etc around Scandanavia with resonable FPS (20-22) all with FISD sceneries installed, the same goes for the fabulous UNNT, USSS and around the Aegean again with pretty detailed HSP scenery :dance:

I can fly most other Continents / Countries / Airports with 20+FPS

I have most, if not all of the WOI packages installed also, however when I attempt to fly anywhere in the UK or Central USA (default scenery) my FPS are drastic, lucky to be getting 9-10

Is this something to do with AI perhaps or is my system that mediocre that I should be happy with what I am getting.

System Specs

Intel Celeron 2.3Ghz CPU
1278 MB RAM
NVIDIA GeForce 6200 256MB

Any help greatly appreciated. :dance:

The AI in the US and UK is probably much grater than anywhere else to be honest by virtue of thats where more aircraft fly. To be honest I'm amazed your running it at all on a celeron. They have very little cache which means the processor and memory are more heavily loaded. If you were ever upgrading never buy a celeron or the duron (or whatever AMD are calling there low end alternative these days)

Thanks so much Ben, so you predict a noticeable improvement if I look at a new CPU.....forgive my ignorance but is there much involved in the replacement and any recommendations?

I felt I should be getting better results having upgrading RAM and video.

Thanks again

Hi Jonny,

Depends on your mother board, as it will only support certain types of CPU and certain speeds. I was just saying that a CPU with more onbord cache (very high speed memory thats actually built into the processor) would probably make a difference as celerons were never designed for anything other than solitaire. The Celeron chip was designed for the entry level business parket, where users are only running something like work or outlook. They really don't lend themselves to anything else. Changing the cpu is usually straight forward, but you need to make sure that a. your motherboard will work with your new processor, and b.that you buy a suitable heat sink for the new processor.

Celerons generate very little heat compared to pentiums, so that is very important.

You should be able to replace the Celeron with one of the 478 pin Pentium 4 range. Which one depends on your motherboard.

A 2.8GHz P4 is going for around £20-£25 on eBay, but there are various versions, so if you can identify your motherboard it would help.

Also the memory may be of a slower refresh rate to go with the Celeron. The memory speed can be tested without opening up the PC.

I cannot recall what happens if you put a P4 with slower than optimal memory. It may work, but not sure if some things are slowed down to work together?

Its me again Guys,

I bit the bullet and got a new CPU, I'm sitting here looking at it, in fact I have been looking at it for a couple of days.

Its fully compatible (3.2 Ghz Socket 478 Intel Pentium 4) I even got the paste stuff to reattach the heat sink and an extra GB of RAM, problem is I am somewhat reluctant to attempt fitting it.

I read horror stories of XP crashes and any pre change saved data being lost, the CPU might need an updated heatsink / fan.

Can anyone here help me put this little piece of technology in a new home.

Thanks HELP

Well I've changed 478 P4s in several motherboards as the faster ones have reduced in price. All that has happened is the BIOS now tells me on boot up that the CPU speed is for example 2.80 Ghz instead of what it used to be. No crashes in XP/Linux, etc

Of more concern is indeed the heat sink. A 3.2Ghz P4 is just about the top speed of that series so maximum heat output. Certainly more than the 2.3Ghz Celeron. Intel did do a "copper core" heat sink for the >3Ghz P4. I think that it has the copper visible and the fins on the heat sink are different.

Let me see what I can find out.

Meanwhile is you current heatsink/fan a standard Intel version?

Edit: which P4 do you have - it will say something like SL6PF on the top. The "6PF" will be different for yours.

Thanks for getting back ianhind,

The details provided are SL7NB 533 1MB, sorry this is gobbledigook to me, maybe you can decipher.

Just on a side note, my heatsink and fan are separate, they sit beside one and other as apposed to the fan on top, is this significant :think:

To be honest at present I am getting 24-26 fps sitting on the ground in Mikonos on the Aerworx B200, maybe I am taking a big chance for nothing

I just miss using major Airports in the UK such as EGLL, only getting 1-5 fps there!

Forgot to mention that I recently had my mother board replaced...the tech guys installed an AsRock P4i65G and I presume I'm using the standard intel stuff.

Looks as though I may be goosed, from what I can see this is actually a notebook CPU thus "NB" although on the description (ebay) it claims to be for both...serves me right for being stupid!....and hasty! :brick: